This invention relates to a disk transport apparatus for transporting a disk as a recording medium and a disk apparatus which includes a disk transport apparatus of the type mentioned.
Disk apparatus are known in the past which read out information recorded on a disk such as a CD (Compact Disc), a DVD (Digital Versatile Disc) or a BD (Blu-ray disk: registered trademark) and record information on the disk. Such known disk apparatus of the past include a tray type disk apparatus and a slot type disk apparatus which use different transport mechanisms for transporting a disk into the disk apparatus.
One of such known tray type disk apparatus of the past includes a tray for receiving a disk placed thereon and transports the tray to the outside and the inside of a housing of the disk apparatus to transport a disk to the outside and the inside of the housing.
Another one of the tray type disk apparatus of the past includes an arm for transporting a disk inserted in an opening for disk accommodation. A tray type disk apparatus of the type just described is disclosed, for example, in Japanese Patent Laid-Open No. 2005-251362 (hereinafter referred to as Patent Document 1).
In the disk apparatus disclosed in Patent Document 1, two sliders are provided in the proximity of the opening for disk accommodation for sliding movement in a disk insertion direction into the opening and also in a perpendicular direction to the insertion direction. An arm is provided for pivotal motion on each of the two sliders and has two rotatable rollers provided at the opposite ends thereof. The arms are provided in an inclined relationship to the disk insertion direction for pivotal motion toward and away from each other around the axes of those rollers which are provided adjacent the opening.
If a disk is inserted into the opening of the disk apparatus, then an end edge of the disk is contacted with the rollers of the arms on the opening side to slidably move the sliders in directions in which they are spaced away from each other in accordance with the diametrical dimension of the disk. Then, the arms provided on the sliders are pivoted away from each other while the disk is moved in. In this state, the sliders slidably move in the disk insertion direction to accommodate the disk into the inside of the apparatus.
On the other hand, when the disk is to be carried out, the rollers, arms and sliders operate reversely to those upon carrying in of the disk to push out the disk from the opening.
However, in the disk apparatus disclosed in Patent Document 1, if a second disk of a comparatively small diametrical dimension such as, for example, a disk having a diameter of 8 cm is inserted to a position displaced to an end portion of the opening for disk accommodation, occasionally the disk is not transported appropriately.
For example, if a second disk is inserted to a position displaced to an end portion of the opening for disk accommodation which is formed in accordance with a first disk having a comparatively great diametrical dimension such as a disk having a diameter of 12 cm, then the second disk is sometimes inserted into the inside of the apparatus in a state wherein it is gripped by one of the rollers. In such an instance, the disk cannot be placed at an appropriate position in the housing such as a position corresponding to a turntable for rotating the disk.